Cole Younger was an American Confederate guerrilla during the American Civil War. He was born on January 15, 1844, and later became an outlaw leader with the James–Younger Gang.
Cole Younger was born on the Younger family farm in Jackson County, Missouri and his parents are Henry Washington Younger and Bersheba Leighton Fristoe.
Henry Washington Younger is a prosperous farmer who hails from Greenwood, Missouri and Bersheba Leighton Fristoe is the daughter of a prominent Jackson County farmer.
Guerilla warfare took over the state of Missouri during the American Civil War and in the process, Cole Younger‘s father who was a Union supporter, got killed.
He was shot dead by a Union soldier from Kansas. Cole Younger then decided to seek revenge as pro-Confederate guerrilla or “bushwhacker” under William Clarke Quantrill.
In 1862, when the Army had left Missouri, most of the fight was between pro-Union and pro-Confederate partisan.
Over 200 citizens lost their lives when Cole Younger rode with Quantrill in a retaliatory raid on Lawrence, Kansas on August 21, 1863. Later on, Cole Younger joined the Confederate Army and was sent to California on a recruiting mission.
He returned to Missouri only to find out that Missouri was ruled by a militant faction of Unionist Radicals.
Cole Younger Siblings
Cole Younger has three siblings and they are Jim, John and Bob Younger, who were also members of James–Younger Gang.
Bob Younger died in prison on September 16, 1889, after suffering from tuberculosis. On July 10, 1901, with the help of a prison warden, Cole and Jim were paroled.
Subsequently, Jim was founded dead in a hotel room in St. Paul, Minnesota, on October 19, 1902.
He is reported to have committed suicide. Cole wrote a memoir that portrayed himself as a Confederate avenger more than an outlaw, admitting to only one crime, that at Northfield.
Cole also lectured and toured the South with Frank James in a wild west show, The Cole Younger and Frank James Wild West Company, in 1903.
On August 21, 1912, Cole repented from his old ways and became a Christian. On August 16, 1913, he was baptized at Lee’s Summit Christian Church. Cole Younger died, on March 21, 1916.
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